Thair Vadai - Savoury Doughnuts in Curd

THAIR VADAI - Savoury doughnuts in curd

Those were the days when I never managed to get a hole in my vadai!! Since my family loved Thair Vadais, I prepared them quite often, but with the distinctive holes missing! However, it was compensated by the coarse chilly, coconut and ginger paste, green coriander dressing, and the spicy seasoning in a thick curd base.

As my babies grew up and were ready to taste Thair Vadais, I started making them with minimum spice and a smooth curd base. This became a hit with the rest of the family members as well, since then my thair vadais on popular demand remain the same - without holes, and without the heavy masala paste. These blobs in smooth curd, can easily be mistaken for some nice desert or sweet! I still remember the surprised look on the face of my daughters’ music teacher when he had the first bite of my Thair Vadai, expecting it be a sweet. But he did enjoy it after all and even requested for a second piece.

INGREDIENTS:
Black gram dal – 1 cup
Fresh ginger – 1” piece
Salt - 1tsp
Thick curd – 3 cups
Chilly powder – 1 pinch
Cumin powder – 1 pinch
Coriander seed powder – 1 pinch
Mustard seeds – ¼ tsp
Cumin seeds – ¼ tsp
Carrot - 1 (grated)
Sugar – ¼ tsp
Fresh coriander – a few
Oil - for frying

METHOD:
1. Soak the dal for half an hour.
2. Grind into a smooth batter adding little water at a time, along with ginger and 1/2tsp of salt, and leave it aside. The batter can be of idli batter consistency (this is more thin than what is traditionally made for vadais, but gives spongy vadais).
3. Add 1/2 tsp of salt and sugar to the thick curd and beat well to a smooth paste, without any lumps.
4. Take 2 tbsps of this curd and dilute it with 2 glasses of water, and keep the rest aside.
5. Heat oil and drop one spoon of batter into it and fry into a golden brown vadai.
Six to eight vadais can be fried at a time.
6. Drain the first batch of vadais, and immediately immerse them in the watery curd, prepared in step 4.
7. Now start frying the next batch.
8. Remove the first batch of vadais, which have now bloated, by absorbing the diluted curd, and arrange them in a shallow dish. This creates space for immersing the second batch of vadais.
9. Arrange all the fried and soaked vadais in the shallow dish.
10. Mix in the carrot gratings and chopped coriander into the thick curd that was set aside.
11. Sprinkle the chilly powder, cumin powder and coriander powder on top of the curd. Don't mix yet.
12. Heat 2 tsps of oil and add mustard seeds and cumin seeds.
13. When the seasoning splutters, pour it all over the spice powders on the curd cooking them. You can now mix well.
14. Now pour the seasoned curd mixture covering all over the vadais.

Enjoy these spongy luscious Thair Vadais with loved ones.

Strawberry Ice Cream

"...once you start, this ice-cream making thing become addictive" from Nigella Lawson.

I think it's absolutely true as I'm getting addictive in making ice cream. Once you master the method of making custard, making ice cream is just easy-peasy. Again, this recipe extracted from the book "Forever Summer". This is a very refreshing ice cream with very rich strawberry flavor. It's so good to have a big scoop especially living in this hot and humid land.

Recipe extracted from "Forever Summer"

1. Hull and rougly chop the strawberries, put them into a bowl and sprinkle over 2 tablespoons of caster sugar and leave them to steep and infuse with flavour.
2. Pour the milk and cream into a heavy-based saucepan, and add the vanilla pod, split down the middle lengthways. Bring the pan nearly to the boil and then take it off the heat and leave to infuse for 20 minutes. (I used vanilla extract. So, I added it into the custard at the end.)
3. In a large bowl whisk the egg yolks and the sugar until thick and pale yellow. Take the vanilla pod out of the milk and cream and pour, whisking the while, the warm liquid over the yolks. Put the cleaned-out pan back on the heat with the cream, milk, egg and sugar mixture an stir the custard until it thickens, then take it off the heat and pour it into a bowl to cool.
4. Puree the strawberries in a processor, and when the custard is cool fold in the lemon juice and strawberry puree.
5. Freeze the ice cream in an ice-cream maker then put it into an ice cream container at least 20 minute before serving. (I used kitchen Aid Ice cream bowl for 20 minutes of whisking)

Methi Matar Malai

For the first time in my life, I had this dish in one of the Indian restaurants in Thailand a couple of months back. My husband and I always prefer Indian food wherever we travel. Fortunately we found an Indian restaurant near the hotel where we stayed. Initially we were a bit skeptical about that restaurant because we both were the only customers for them :-) for that night I believe. We ordered my all time favorite paneer butter masala, nans and rice. The manager suggested that methi matar malai was their speciality. So we ordered that as well. When the food came, we started to dig in. I loved both paneer butter masala and methi matar malai. It was way too good! I have not had such delicious food even in India. Apparently the chefs who cook there(in Thailand hotel) are from Taj Hotel(India). Food was a little expensive though. But it was worth every penny!

I was happy when Sujatha posted her Methi Malai Matar recipe. I made it today and totally loved it. I can't stop thinking about our trip to Thailand and the restaurant where we had this methi malai matar. It goes very well with nans/rotis. It is rich, creamy and delicious! Give it a try girls, you will go ga- ga over it :) I made a few additions to her recipe.

Sending this to Mansi's Vegetarian Thanksgiving-Recipe Carnival Event.
My version:

Ingredients:
Onion chopped-1 cup
Ginger chopped-1/2 tsp
Garlic chopped-1 pod
Jeera-1/2 tsp
Salt
Frozen Peas-3/4 cup
Methi leaves-1 cup
Kasuri methi crushed(optional)-a few strands
Green chilli-1
Oil-1 tbsp
Curd-1 tbsp
Half and Half(cream/malai)-1/2 cup or less depending on the consistency you want

Spice powders(quantity can be adjusted according to your taste buds):
Garam masala-1/2 tsp
Kitchen king masala(my gravies are never complete without this wonderful powder)-1/2 tsp
Chilli powder-1/4 tsp
Turmeric powder-1/4 tsp
Coriander powder-1/2 tsp

Method:
Heat oil. Tamper jeera. Fry onions, ginger, garlic, green chilli till onions turn golden brown. Sprinkle salt. Add fresh methi leaves. Fry for a couple of minutes till it shrinks. Add frozen peas, spice powders, curd and fry for a minute. Add Half and half. Bring the mixture to a boil. Add little water to desired consistency. Simmer for 2-3 mintues. Garnish with kasuri methi. Serve with nans or roti.